subject: Travel Safely with Insurance [print this page] Travel Safely with Insurance
Delays, cancellations, mishandled luggage, and other unforeseen events can arise, particularly during busy travel seasons. Travel insurance can offer peace of mind and important protections for these kinds of situations. Coverage is not just for the business or frequent traveler; cheap travel insurance, a growing market, makes coverage available, competitive, and surprisingly accessible to most.
Like most insurance, coverage may vary depending on the policy. The important areas include:
1. Illness, injury or death. This coverage typically protects against losses caused by personal mishapsor if a trip has to be cancelled because of the illness, injury, or a death of a close family member at home.
2. Medical Assistance and Emergency Evacuation. Perhaps the most attractive feature of having a travel policy is coverage for medical assistance and emergency evacuation.
Consider this scenario: While holidaying in Costa Rica, a person suffers serious medical distress, and the local hospitals aren't equipped with the capacity or technology to provide the urgently needed care for that patient. What can be done? With travel insurance, even cheap travel insurance, the insurer's network will likely be able to arrange ground and air transportation for the patient to be taken to the nearest hospital where the best care can be received.
3. Operator failure. Look for a policy that will compensate in case a tour operator fails, defaults, or ceases operations. That's more beneficial than a policy that only pays out in the case of a tour operator's bankruptcy.
4. Pre-existing conditions. Some policies exclude compensation if the trip is cancelled or suspended by a medical problem that arose up to 60 days before purchasing the policy. (A condition controlled by medication is acceptable though.) Other policies won't cover pre-existing conditions that require treatment or medical advice within 90 to 180 days of buying the policy.
Travel policies can be purchased at travel agencies, from online travel insurance agents, and through some credit card companies and insurance companies. Traveling consumers should also be aware that many governments, for instance in the European Union, now require visitors to have travel insurance before entering the country, so obtaining coverage may actually be compulsory. Fortunately, the process doesn't have to be lengthy. Online travel insurance providers, many with real-time quoting and binding services, are just a few keystrokes away.
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